10 unusual fossils

If someone is lucky enough on the beach to find fossilized seashells, it is possible to recognize them easily. But there are many fossils, looking for that hard to guess what they represented. The problem is compounded by the fact that many of the fossils are incomplete or poorly preserved. Sometimes the doubts are even scientists. In our review of the 10-ka fossils, which for many decades was not recognized.

1. Ammonites

Fossilized Ammonites are quite common today, but for thousands of years it took for anything except shellfish. The ancient Greeks thought they were RAM horns, and named the Amish in honor of the Egyptian God Amun, who was depicted with similar horns. The ancient Chinese called it the stone-horns for the same reason. In Nepal, fossilized Ammonites were considered a relic left by the God Vishnu. The Vikings thought of them as sacred petrified offspring of the world serpent of Ermengarda.

In the middle ages Ammonites were known in Europe as snake stones because it was believed that it was the petrified body of a coiled serpent, which turned into stone and Christian saints. Today it became known that the Ammonites is only fossilized shells of creatures that became extinct about four hundred million years ago.

2. Fish teeth

Fossil teeth of fishes in different centuries believed different things. Some ancient species of fish were flat molars for crushing shellfish. In Greece, and later in Ballycastle Europe, the fossil remains of these teeth were considered magical stones, and often they were called toad-stones. Such teeth are used in jewelry, but also believed that they can be used to cure epilepsy and poisoning. In Japan, petrified of flat and sharp teeth of sharks were considered the claws of a terrible monster tengu, Europe teeth – tongue devil.

3. Trees

Lepidodendron is an ancient tree, whose bark was covered with large flat scales, like a pine cone. The leaves of this tree were similar to the stems, so lepidodendron considered more of a grass than a tree. A large part of deposits of coal in Europe is the remains of these ancient plants. Previously often found whole petrified trunks of lepidodendron, the length of the shaft could be up to thirty meters, and the thickness is about one meter. In the 19th century they were given for the body of serpents and dragons.

4. Foraminifera

The Pacific beaches in the South of Japan can be found quite unusual grit. Many of them are in the shape of tiny stars, less than a millimeter in diameter. Local legends say that the remains of the unfortunate children of the heavenly Union of two stars. These star children have died either from falling on the ground, or had killed a monstrous serpent that dwells in the sea near the Japanese island of Okinawa. Actually, those tiny stars are the remains of the spiny shells of other life forms: amoeboid creatures called foraminifera.

5. Protoceratops

Dinosaurs called protoceratops were relatives of the more famous Triceratops. They walked on four legs and were about the size of a large dog, though much heavier. The majority of protoceratops was a large skull with a bird beak and a bony frill growing from the back of the skull. People who are not familiar with dinosaurs, preserved skeletons of protoceratops resembled fantastical and bizarre creatures. Because of their size, these dinosaurs were considered small lions with a hooked beak like the eagle. It is possible that protoceratops is a type of mythical griffins.

6. Belemnites

Belemnites were ancient animals that resembled squid. Unlike squid, they had a skeleton, and all of their ten tentacles were of the same length, and they were covered with tiny hooks. Belemnites lived in the same time as the dinosaurs, inhabiting the sea. The most frequently found fossilized parts of skeletons of belemnites, which look like long bullets. In Europe, people thought these fossils is thunderbolts of the gods that fell to the ground. Other people thought that belemnites belonged to the elves, not the gods, considering them the fingers of elves, fairy candles or arrows of the elves.

7. Anchisaurus

Anchisaurus were one of the earliest types of dinosaurs. They were herbivores, had long necks and tails, and was also the early relatives of the Brontosaurus and the Diplodocus. Only, unlike them, the size of anchisaurus was only 2m. paradoxically, but originally the bones of these dinosaurs took over the bones of primitive ancestor of man.

8. Mastodons and mammoths

Mastodons and mammoths.

Several thousand years ago on the icy ground wandering giant mammoths and mastodons. They looked like hairy elephants with huge tusks. Like modern elephants, these animals were developed very strong trunks, making the skeletal morphology of these animals suggested a large hole in the skull. People who have never seen elephants, had assumed that these huge fossilized skull with a giant hole in the front belong to the Cyclopes, the mythical one-eyed giant humanoid.

9. Sea urchins

Sea urchins – spiny, spherical creatures that are commonly found along the shores of the sea. Sea urchins have existed for hundreds of millions of years, and after their ancient ancestors left many fossils. In England such fossils took to be supernatural crowns, loaves of bread, or magical snake eggs. In Denmark they thought was thunder stones, because they allegedly provided the moisture before severe storms.

10. Hominids

The ancestors of modern humans left behind a lot of fossils all over the earth. Because of their apparent inconsistency with the bones of people, often of similar fossils considered proof of various humanoid mythical creatures mentioned in the Bible, for example, giants and demons. Other cultures have found skeletons of Neanderthals gave rise to the legend of the Yeti and other creatures Geminiani

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